[1][2] The criminal charges were supported by a consortium of intellectual rights holders led by the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI), who filed individual civil compensation claims against the owners of The Pirate Bay.

On 1 February 2012, the Supreme Court of Sweden refused to hear an appeal in the case, prompting the site to change its official domain name from thepiratebay.org to thepiratebay.se.

In late 2007, a four thousand page report was produced by the prosecutor in preparation for a trial,[17] containing email and SMS messages, payment documents, police interrogation records, and screenshots of The Pirate Bay site.

[18][19] On 31 January 2008 Swedish prosecutors filed charges against four individuals they associated with The Pirate Bay for "promoting other people's infringements of copyright laws".

[24] The live audio and archive sections done in cooperation with Dagens Eko were part of the 24 Direkt program, which became one of their most viewed online content during the trial, second only to Melodifestivalen.

Defense attorney Jonas Nilsson insisted that "the individual Internet users who use Pirate Bay services... must answer for the material they have in their possession or the files they plan to share with others.

Peter Danowsky, legal counsel for the music companies, stated "It's a largely technical issue that changes nothing in terms of our compensation claims and has no bearing whatsoever on the main case against The Pirate Bay.

[4] On the third day of The Pirate Bay trial, prosecution witnesses claimed damages on the basis that it should have obtained worldwide licenses for the content it distributed.

Samuelson said the persons behind The Pirate Bay could not be held collectively responsible for a crime committed by other identifiable individuals, such as "King Kong".

[39] The term "King Kong defense" was quickly popularized by blogs, file sharing news feeds, and media reports on the Pirate Bay trial.

[41] In its April verdict, the court found that because the defendants indeed had collective responsibility for the site and knew some torrent files on it pointed to copyrighted material, the EU directive did not apply.

“Suddenly, the door opens and in walks an entirely new witness.” The presiding judge stopped the case to deliberate the matter and found in favor of the defense, instructing the prosecution to immediately hand over all material they planned to use.

The prosecution attempted to show the Pirate Bay as an immensely profitable business that made its money helping others violate copyright law.

[45] They cited contradicting academic research on the effects of file sharing on sales in the music and film industry globally[46] and regionally in Sweden.

[53] The entertainment industry lawyers appealed as well, on reintroducing the dismissed charge and on the method of calculating damages, which in their opinion does not fully cover the lost income.

[60][61] Sociology of law professor Håkan Hyden criticised the exceptionally harsh sentence on both the prison time and large amount of compensation awarded,[62] and some legal analysts expect the punishments to be radically lowered in higher courts.

Some high-profile copyright holders publicly defended the verdict, with former Beatles member Paul McCartney commenting to the BBC that "if you get on a bus, you've got to pay.

"[70] In a column in Dagens Nyheter, composer and professor Roger Wallis, who was involved in the trial, condemned the verdict and its effects as paralyzing Swedish IT innovation on new ways of doing business.

Several Swedish file sharing sites have closed voluntarily with The Pirate Bay verdict as a deterrent and as a result of further police investigation.

[82] On 20 April 2009, Anonymous mobilized "Operation Baylout", which included a DDoS attack on the IFPI International website, causing the site to go offline for a few hours.

[83][84] Two artists originally mentioned in the indictment, Advance Patrol and Max Peezay, later went on to release their work on The Pirate Bay in spring 2009.

[85][86] Gottfrid Svartholm, one of the TPB founding members, was arrested on 2 September 2012, in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, while evading Swedish authorities following the 2009 verdict and conviction.

[91] According to Roswall, this type of concurrent employment would not be an individual incident, but that the decision of possible bias would be for the court to decide, and that the investigator is not a key witness in the case.

Sveriges Radio P3 News organized an investigation that found on 23 April that Norström had several engagements with organisations interested in intellectual property issues.

Peter Danowsky, Monique Wadsted and Henrik Pontén from the prosecution side are also members of one of the organisations, the Swedish Copyright Association (SFU).

The district court along with the prosecutor formally defended judges' memberships in these types of organisations as a way to gain knowledge on copyright issues.

[122][123][124] The criminal charges against The Pirate Bay are directly supported by the following prosecution witnesses:[125] After sentencing, the defendants decided to appeal the verdict of the first trial.

[132] On 18 February 2009 the Norwegian socialist party Red began a global campaign in support of The Pirate Bay and filesharers worldwide that lasted until 1 May.

Red politician Elin Volder Rutle is the initiator of the campaign and she states to the media that "If the guys behind Pirate Bay are criminals, then so am I, and so are most other Norwegians.

This was rejected by the judge but quickly caught on amongst supporters of The Pirate Bay following the proceedings via live feeds and other Internet services.